The Cat's Riddle
by Buffalo Wing
Summary: The Sphinx of legend would devour persons who could not answer their riddles.
1. Truffle Turmoil

_Excerpt from "3", pg. 35_

_Gravity Falls Sphinx_

_The sphinx is said to be a wise and powerful creature, blessed with the sleek body of a feline and the gifted mind of man. It has come to my attention that Sphinx do not only roam the deserts of Egypt. I have witnessed two small people, with kitten paws and sun-bright eyes, circling a specific area deep within the forest of Gravity Falls. When I tried to approach them, they fled._

_I do not know what the Sphinx may be doing here, or what they are protecting. I do not know if they can even speak. Perhaps they are just a strange breed of wild cat. Perhaps they are reincarnated Gods. Whatever the case, approach with caution. Though these specific specimens are small, the Sphinx of legend would devour persons who could not answer their riddles. Either stay back, or have a good head on your shoulders._

_They may just take it off._

* * *

If Dipper had his way, he would've gone back ages ago.

He had been wandering through the pine forest alongside a girl and her pig for what felt like countless hours. His eyes were drooping and his legs were jello tubes. The boy had been doing much more running than he was used to, and that was saying something. It seemed like he was outrunning dangerous monsters and crazed lunatics once a week during his stay at Gravity Falls. He never knew that a pig could be the main glutton of his energy.

Said pig was snuffling along the ground, occasional oinks emerging from his half-hidden snout. A colorful girl with coco curls stood a heartbeat behind him, pumping her arms and chanting.

"Go, go, go, go, go!"

It was a wonder she hadn't stopped to take a breath yet.

Dipper groaned, leaning against the rough bark of a tree. "Did he find any yet?" he asked, voice straining. He knew he was borderline whining, but the boy couldn't help it. They'd been out here for hours and hadn't gotten a single fruit for their labor.

"Nope!" Mabel responded cheerfully, abandoning her mantra. "But I've got a good feeling! Waddles seems really focused right now."

"He's been focused since noon!"

"Do not question the Waddles!"

"But-"

"Do not question!"

A slew of oinking, growing steadily fainter, interupted the bickering twins.

"The Waddles has spoken!" Mabel shouted, chasing after her fleeing pig. Dipper sighed, hanging back for a second to readjust his hat. The darn pig probably just got spooked by a deer again.

Steadying his overworked legs, the boy began to jog after the duo. He kept his sister's bright orange sweater in his constant line of sight, which was difficult as she weaved between the trees. As the sun began to dip toward the horizon, he grew grateful for her luminous taste in fashion.

She stopped and her silhouette kneeled. Dipper stopped as well, lifting off his hat. He reach inside the cap and pulled out a small length of red ribbon, pilfered from Mabel's side of the attic. With expert hands, he tied the ribbon around the middle of the smallest tree to his right. He stepped back, surveying his work, and nodded.

His sister's excited shouting urged him to return to his trek. As the distance between them grew from tens to single-digit yards, he noticed the look of pure unabashed pride gracing her features.

"He did it," the boy panted in disbelief. "He actually found one."

She held it up in one hand, displaying their prize to the needles above them. The tiny black morsel was held fast between her thumb and forefinger, hardly bigger than a ping-pong ball.

"My pig is a truffle-hunting master!"

"It's not gigantic, but it could probably net us a few bucks." Dipper exclaimed, finding energy in the fact that their efforts had not entirely been in vain. He grinned at his sister. She grinned back, her signature silver smile glinting in the dying daylight. While maintaining direct eye contact with her overjoyed brother, Mabel flicked her wrist and promptly popped the expensive fungus into her mouth.

Dipper's jaw dropped. He held up a hand, eye twitching.

"Blargh!" A half-chewed pile splattered onto the earthen floor, where it was devoured by the hungry pig that had been circling them. "That wasn't chocolate! What the heck Dipper, it isn't April Fools Day!"

Dipper tried to form a coherent sentence, but each attempt dribbled down his chin once it left his lips. His sister glared at him, fuming and tapping her foot. The girl quite obviously thought she deserved an apology.

"Mabel! Oregon truffles are mushrooms! Not chocolate! That doesn't even make sense!"

"Shut up, you don't make sense!"

"That doesn't make sense, either!"

"Shut up!"

"I will not! You just wasted what we've been looking for all afternoon!"

"Yeah well you're a big nerd! How the heck was I supposed to know you didn't mean chocolate?"

"Why would chocolate grow in a forest?"

"Weirder stuff has happened, Dipper!"

He had to give her that one. Unable to find a suitable retort, his anger began spilling away. The red hot fury drained out of his cheeks and into his hands, which slowly unclenched.

"Yeah, I know," he replied, standing beside her.

"Sorry," she mumbled, kicking at the loose pine needles beneath her feet.

"It's alright." He punched her lightly on the arm, and she returned the favor by slugging him back. He winced and rubbed his smarting limb.

Waddles, who had observed the entire ordeal, began to make happy shnuffling noises by Mabel's foot. "Aw, family hug!" she exclaimed, scooping up the fifteen pound oinker and pulling her brother's head down beside her own, forcing him to lean over.

"Yay! This is a picture perfect moment!" She momentarily let go of her brother in order to dig through her sweater's front pocket. Within seconds her arm was back around his neck and a camera was clenched beneath her fingers. Mabel flashed her metal smile. Dipper's mouth stayed closed, but he smiled nonetheless. With a blinding flash the image was saved to the tiny device. Dipper attempted to blink away the floating colors.

"We should head back now," he decided, peering up at the sky through the crevices in the treetops. Sunset-orange was bleeding across the previously darkening blue, and the light was fading quite quickly.

"Yeah, it is getting late. Waddles, away!" Mabel poked the pig on the behind and he took off like a rocket, leaving the two twins to follow him. Dipper placed a hand on the book hidden within his vest. The woods of Gravity Falls always made him uncomfortable. Especially at night.

Behind the long-gone twins, a beast shifted it's grip and slid down, down, down the length of bark. It blinked, watching the orange and blue and pink leave the haven of trees. It took a deep breath, closed it's sun-bright eyes, and followed the trail of red ribbons.

**A/N: This was an idea I've been tossing around for a while. Hopefully it goes somewhere.**


	2. Clicking Cat

Click, click, click.

Dipper tapped the buttons on the remote, eyes glazed. He hardly saw what he was watching anymore; the colors kept changing and the sound kept switching. He was bored.

"I'm so bored," he yawned, solidifying the sleepy thought.

Click, click, click.

Mabel looked up from her knitting needles, laying her bright green creation in her lap. Waddles lay sleeping beside her, and she absentmindedly placed her hand on his peach-fuzz back. Her eyelids drooped down and she yawned in return.

"Gross, you infected me with tired. Now we have to be quarantined."

She pushed Dipper's leg in mock anger, and he pushed back. They laughed.

Mabel stood up, groaning and rubbing her tiny hands together. She observed her newest sweater that lay spread-eagle on the floor. "I guess I can finish the collar tomorrow."

Dipper nodded, his head dipping down into his chest for the briefest of seconds. His own snore startled him awake.

"To bed!" she announced with muted enthusiasm.

"To bed," Dipper agreed. He picked up the remote and placed a finger on the "off" button.

Click.

Mabel was already ascending the stairs to their makeshift bedroom. Dipper followed his twin.

Ratty bedsheets and a stone-stiff pillow never felt so good. Dipper's aching legs rejoiced as he drifted off into a deep, exercise-induced slumber. It was too bad they didn't make any money, but he still had fun.

The events of the day unfolded into a blissful, dreamless sleep.

Click, click, click.

Dipper groaned and rolled over. After a minute of silence, he felt his conscious mind growing numb again. He slipped into oblivion with a sigh.

Click, click, click.

"Mabel, quit knitting. The collar can wait."

Mabel's soft snores stopped.

"Huh?" she mumbled through her braces. Dipper heard her bedsprings protest as she rolled.

Click, click, click.

"Are you chewing gum or something? Quit it."

"You quit it. I know you're doing it, Mabel. Quit being annoying."

"You're annoying."

"No you are."

"Well now I'm up and have to pee. Good job Dipper."

Her bed squealed once more as she hopped down. Once her heavy stomping retreated, Dipper closed his eyes once again. Wendy drifted in and out of his mind, and he relived conversations he had with her last week. Succesful ones, with no mention of Robbie or guitars or skinny jeans. He could almost smell her pine-scented hair...

Click.

A shout of anger burbled up in his chest and Dipper threw his pillow at Mabel's empty bed.

Dipper paled and glanced out the window, visions of pale white women with long fingernails staining his thoughts. He had just read about banshees, and hoped to never see one, or hear their mournful screams.

Fortunately, all he could see was the paper-thin sliver of the moon and the pine forest beyond the shack. A few clouds hung in the sky, and from the way some trees were bending, it was probably a bit windy out tonight. But there were no banshees. And there was no clicking.

Still feeling a bit on edge, Dipper reached for the book hidden beneath his pillow. He flipped through the pages, looking for nothing. Gravity Falls was a strange town. He knew that by heart, and he knew that odd clicking could either be suicide-bomber bugs hitting a window, or a zombie trying to scratch their way inside. So he flipped through the pages, skimming for the word "clicking" or "noises."

He was knee-deep in information about some very interesting fae when he heard Mabel return. She was humming softly to herself, and though Dipper didn't recognize the tune, he guessed that it was probably a new single from Rustin Hieber. The pop star was Mabel's celebrity obsession, and his face was the newest addition to her sparkly poster collection.

The girl pounced on her bed and her notes fluctuated wildly, then stopped. Dipper hardly looked up from his book, too into his research to feel tired anymore. He flipped the page, thinking up plans to go on a fairy hunt with Mabel tomorrow. Or today, he chuckled to himself.

"Uh...Dipper?" Mabel's voice pulled him out of his reading, and he glanced across the room at her. She was pale, and staring pointedly at their window. Her knuckles were white around her blanket, and she was visibly shaking.

"What is that thing?"

Click, click, click.

Dipper looked out the window and was almost instantly blinded. He shouted, covering his eyes with the palms of his hands. He heard Mabel leap off her bed and race to the window, shouting "Shoo, shoo!" at whatever thing she had seen. There was a loud screech outside and then rapid clicking. It headed up above their heads, onto the roof, and then nowhere.

Dipper felt an arm around him and a hand by his eye. "Dip, are you ok? What was that thing? What'd it do to you?"

Dipper shook away the sunspots in his vision and blinked. He could see, though his eyes still pained him. "I don't know," he replied. "I couldn't see it. It was like looking into the sun."

"Then how come I could see it?" she asked.

"I dunno," he replied. "What did it look like?"

She got a weird look in her eyes, then looked out the window.

"Well..."she started. Dipper held his breath, his paranoid side expecting an accurate description of Medusa, or a flame spirit, or even a bunch of will-o-wisps.

"It looked like a cat."


End file.
